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Expert: - 3/30/2009


Question
About a week and a half ago I was doing community service for a man who had AIDS. Myself and some friends were doing habitat for humanity type work, cleaning, building, painting etc. At one point the AIDS infected individual accidently cut his face. I noticed the blood and freaked out. I immediately left the house and put on gloves. I never came into physical contact with the infected person. Shortly after he realized the cut he left and got it patched up by a doctor. My whole body was covered (pants and long sleeves). I examined my hands for any cuts. Didn't notice anything. The next day I noticed a small- size of the tip of  a pen- scratch on the top of a finger. I'm really paranoid that somehow I came into contact with this man's blood. I know I never touched him but I was in his house. NO visible trace of blood came into contact with me.

Is it possible that a nonvisible amount of AIDS infected blood (he has a high viral load) somehow got into my eye? into a small, undetectable scratch somewhere on my body? without even knowing it? What about on the doorknob? I know the virus dies in like a minute, but what if I grabbed the doorknob after him and his blood was on it- and I touched my eye after touching a nonvisable amount of blood? Does viral load count? If a nonvisible amount of blood gets on me is it possible to become infected? How small does a wound have to be?

Seeing blood that I know was infected is creating extreme anxiety for me. I got an HIV test 2 days after the incident. IT was neg.--but i don't think it would have showed up that early anyway?

BOTTOM LINE-He was bleeding. I was in the same room. I had not cuts and never saw blood on me or a surface other than his skin-- risk factors for me?

ALSO- At one point he handed me a handful of screws (I was putting together a patio in his backyard). I ddn't see any blood on me. On the top of one of his hands he had some old sores which freaked me out. I wasn't wearing gloves when he handed over the screws. Once again, no visible blood- no cuts on me--risk factors?

Answer
My dear questioner,

I don't know whether someone told you that you're highly knowledgeable, analytical.

If you go through the question (I went through line by line), you'll find that the answer is already there. There's no rick of being HIV infected in the way and the context you described. I assume, you had no open wounds, no sores, you're not bleeding and you know that HIV survives fairly shorter period without any receptor. In absence of any receptor, there's nothing to be worried about of being infected.

So, don't you worry and relax.

Sincere regards,
Gorkey

AIDS

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Gorkey Gourab

Expertise

Social and behavioral issues related to HIV transmission, sexually transmitted infections, Human Rights issues, rights of marginalized populations, gender and sexuality, research design and analysis related social & behavioral issues, , computer assisted qualitative data analysis and data management (using ATLAS.ti, ANTHROPAC, NVivo 8)

Experience

Specialized in Medical Anthropology. Working on Social and behavioral studies related to HIV transmission as well as Human Rights issues. Specialization in gender, sexuality, masculinity, behavioral studies related to HIV transmission. Qualitative research, programmatic and M&E experience with MSM, hijra (TG), indigenous groups, female sex workers for more than 7 years.

Organizations
International Center for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) as Manager - M&E (Qualitative) with Center for HIV and AIDS

Publications
International peer-reviewed journals & technical papers: (1) Khan, S. I., Hussain, M. I., Parveen, S., Bhuiyan, M. I., Gourab, G., & Bhuiya, A. (2009). Living on the extreme margin: Social exclusion of the hijra in Bangladesh. Journal of health, population and nutrition. (2) Khan, S. I., Hussain, M. I., Gourab, G., Parveen, S., Bhuiyan, M. I., & Sikder, J. (2008). Not to stigmatize but to humanize sexual lives of the transgender (hijra): condom chat in the AIDS era. Journal of LGBT Health Research (Special issue: issues on male sexual behaviors and HIV risk in South Asia). Working papers: (1) Khan, S. I., Gourab, G., Ahmed, T., Sarker, G. F., Chowdhury, F. K., Ghosh, S., et al. (2009). Understanding the operational dynamics and possible HIV interventions for residence-based female sex workers in two divisional cities in Bangladesh. Dhaka, Bangladesh: NASP, Save the Children USA and icddr,b. Presentations in scientific meetings and conferences: (1) Khan, S. I., Hussain, M. I., Gourab, G. & Azim, T. (2011, 16 March 2011). Use of a new approach to count and access diverse groups of hijra for scaling up HIV-preventions services in Bangladesh. Poster presented at the 13th Annual Scientific Conference (ASCON XIII), Dhaka. (2) Khan, S. I., Pasa, K., Gourab, G., & Islam, A. (2007). Indigenous populations of Bangladesh: Living with risks and vulnerabilities to STIs/HIV. 8th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP). Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Education/Credentials
MSS (Anthropology), University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh

Awards and Honors
The Vanderbilt-UAB Fogarty International Center AIDS International Training and Research Program (AITRP)Scholarship for the training on HIV-AIDS related qualitative data analysis and manuscript writing (Center for Global Health, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA)

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